In Search of a New Paradigm for Worksite Wellness Programming: Seven Questions to Start the Conversation

Transcription

1 In Search of a New Paradigm for Worksite Wellness Programming: Seven Questions to Start the Conversation Grant Donovan PhD and Donald B. Ardell PD 1. What can the Dunedin Study tell us about wasted worksite wellness dollars? If much of who we are is already set at birth, then can tailoring wellness interventions in the workplace deliver a better dollar value? Questions of genetic influence on health and performance in the workplace 2. Does it really matter if you're fit and healthy when you re going to die anyway? Given we all know we will die someday and given there is good evidence that most people struggle, time and again with their attempts to become fully fit, then why bother if most people cantdoit? Questions of life s meaning and meaninglessness (Mx) on attitudes to work 3. Can we create a physics like wellness formula for expressing the Theory of Happiness? That is to ask, is there an equation as concise, effective, sublime, accurate and useful for health promotion as Einstein's E=mc2 formula? Are you familiar with H = FRC + JBC + MWOs x RIFS? Questions of how we measure happiness at work and the search for a workable formula 4. What is exuberance and should it be a focus of worksite wellness programming? If exuberance is more than a bounty of attractive states, such as high spirits, vitality, enthusiasm, excitement, pep, animation, vigor, zest, eagerness, exhilaration, ebullience, effervescence and sprightliness, then should it be a critical aspiration in worksite wellness programming? Questions of the contest between psychological and physical wellbeing in the workplace 5. What is the wellness value of coffee conversations? Evidence suggests that substituting coffee conversations for performance appraisals can provide wellness and productivity benefits far beyond any other intervention, so why do organizations persist with outdated people management methods? Questions of how group dynamics at work influence personal wellness and performance 6. Where does sex fit into a well rounded worksite wellness program? Recent research at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital showed that having sex four times a week can help people look seven to 12 years younger, so is there room for sex in wellness programming? Questions of how life s most ubiquitous reason for living influences physical and psychological wellbeing at work 7. Is spirituality really a thing? Many wellness programs include spirituality as a core dimension but what is spirituality and does it enhance or harm the overall health state on most people? Questions of how spirituality is defined and how religious beliefs impact personal wellbeing at work

2 AWR # 749 May 24, 2017 BE NORMAL IN SOME WAYS BUT NOT ALL WAYS Introduction to the 749th Edition Greetings and good wishes. This edition contains two essays, one about an upcoming workshop, the other the perils of being normal. Also included are a few of your letters to the editor. Enjoy and consider this from Bertrand Russell: Never try to discourage thinking, for you are sure to succeed. A Paradigm Smashing Breakout at the Upcoming National Wellness Conference Introduction

3 Surely you have had the experience of being at a lecture or workshop and wishing you could ask a question, add a comment or offer an objection to something the speaker has said - or should have said. How many times have you wanted not only to speak your mind aloud, but to hear and then consider what others in the room, not necessarily the speaker, might say about your bottled up insights, unexpressed wisdom and/or promising hypotheses about how to make the world a better place? Many times, I'm sure. It's not easy being patient at such times, longing for a chance to interrupt a rant to refocus everyone's attention on that which really matters? Well, everyone will have this opportunity at the upcoming National Wellness Conference (NWC) June 20th in St. Paul, MN. On this occasion, I will partner with the reliably outrageous Polymath of Perth, the inestimable Dr. Grant Donovan. Instead of long-winded speeches, we will facilitate a session called, In Search of a New Paradigm for Worksite Wellnessas an interactive dialogue about the seven most consequential questions of human existence. Well, perhaps that may be overstating things, but the seven provocative questions will surely excite conference-goers focused on the theme of the 3 1/2 day event, namely, Cultivating Cultures that Flourish. Most important, nobody will have to sit and wait for an opportunity to speak - most of the time available will be devoted to audience participation. (Most is the key word in the preceding sentence.) Engage, Entertain, Inform, Educate and Motivate Grant and I will speak briefly at the beginning and conclusion of the session. With supportive quotations, illuminating slides and stunning, possibly hair-raising proclamations about our REAL wellness beliefs (i.e., life is meaningless, you can't do it, wellness orgasms or DBRU equivalents as keys to happiness and wellbeing and so on), we will initiate dialogues on each of the seven questions. This is how we plan to engage, entertain,

4 inform, educate and motivate attendees while doing our modest part to create our own little culture that flourishes. 1. Do worksite wellness programs really matter if life is meaningless, if most can't manage to sustain wellness lifestyles and if we're all going to die anyway? 2. If, as some studies (e.g., Dunedin) strongly suggest, worksite wellness dollars are being egregiously wasted, what else might be done and to what ends? 3. Can we create a physics-like (e.g., E=MC2) wellness formula for a theory of happiness? (P.S. We have one, should anyone be interested and we'll assume everyone is, therefore we will extend our formula and invite the group to embrace it or come up with a better one.) 4. Is there anything more important than the dimension of exuberance worth promoting with worksite wellness besides, of course, reason, athleticism and liberty? 5. Human sexuality has never been a featured element in worksite wellness. Can this be justified in a truly free society and what might participants be missing as a result of this religion-inspired suppression? 6. We believe the word spirituality should be stricken from the English language and will invite everyone to join in the cause or, better yet, to discuss the reasons we'll put forward in support of this position. 7. The seventh provocation of this workshop is being quarantined until the commencement of the session on If you are planning to attend the conference, you won't want to miss this quest for a better paradigm. Think how you'd feel if you were right there, in St. Paul where it all happened, but failed to attend the watershed workshop after which the NWC was never the same? How would you explain it to your grandchildren? Tolerance-Building Highlights Before turning over the floor to attendees, we will offer up seven sacrificial sacred cows. These are intended more as benign provocations, not pronouncements on high. Neither Grant nor I has any interest in defending our provocations during the session, however much we believe in the evidence that supports each unsettling zinger. The seven assertions up for discussion are:

5 June 20th. If you are somehow in possession of this information, be advised that leakers will be prosecuted! So, that's a preview of our session. Hope you can make it but do not despair if not, for negotiations are underway with a major motion picture studio to make a film of the gathering which could soon enough appear at a major theater near you. All good wishes. Normalcy Leaves Much to be Desired Introduction The simple fact that the American population is overweight, not to mention beset by excessive stress, worry and other negative states, strongly suggests that wellness lifestyles are not the national norm. If you are fit and follow sensible lifestyle patterns (for example, you exercise regularly, accept responsibility, eat wisely and otherwise consciously pursue an advanced state of physical and emotional well-being), you are NOT normal. What's more, you probably don't want to be-at least not if it means you need to be overweight, stressed, worried and negative, like most people! I thought about this the other day when I read about the sport of free-diving, which is a literal breath-taking feat. A young reporter wrote a terrific story about free-divers featured in an IMAX. The title of the movie is Ocean Men. It documents the remarkable tale of two friends who compete to see who can descend the farthest, without oxygen tanks or other supplementary sources of oxygen, and return to the surface of the Earth, alive!

6 Two Decidedly Not Normal People The main characters are natives of Cuba (Pepin Ferraras) and Italy (Umberto Pelizzari), respectively. Both are among the best in the world at this sport and each specializes in a different style of free-diving. Pepin dives 531 feet in the movie. Umberto, however, favors the all natural approach to free-diving and he manages to descend 232 feet. Both divers are reaching these depths and managing to get back to the surface in a single breath. How long can you hold YOUR breath-on terra firma? The narrator explains that at depths of 500 feet, the body experiences a force greater than 200 pounds per square inch of pressure. When this happens, the lungs shrink to the size of oranges and heart rates fall to about 14 beats per minute. Pepin and Umberto usually remain under water for eight minutes, at least! What does this business of free-diving have to do with being normal or with living a wellness lifestyle? Well, to most people, not a thing, I'm sure. Yet, in my strange way of making connections, associating one thing with something else, reading about Pepin and Umberto made me think about what is normal, and what is not. It is NOT normal to be different. It is not normal to be exceptional and unique and to do things that are extraordinarily difficult that need not be done. It is certainly not normal to consciously pursue well-defined life purposes of great consequence to oneself. For most, it is not even normal to accept and embrace responsibility, to seek excellence or to be the best at something. Why be normal? Review the circumstances and challenges you face, and think about Pepin and Umberto. Ponder the strange example of those who do odd and difficult things, such as the free divers, the mountain climbers, cliff divers, parachute jumpers and others like them. The Takeaway Lesson When I think about all these kinds of feats I feel a sense of respect and admiration for the courage they display. I know that what they do makes them feel fully alive, challenged and

7 engaged in the kind of life they find meaningful and worthy. They are not normal, no doubt-and are better off not being so. I don't know if they are living wellness lifestyles or not, but I suspect they would not find REAL wellness very difficult, given their abilities to set goals to do heroic feats and then carry them out. By comparison, REAL wellness seems easy. Not as easy as being normal, but easy compared with the things that some people do voluntarily, and at least as good for you as holding your breath for eight minutes hundreds of feet below the surface of an ocean. Be well, and always look on the bright side of life while thinking critically, seeking exuberance, being athletic and safeguarding your liberty. From James Miller, Graz, Austria The main problem with Mayor Taylor's analysis of the roots of poverty is not in my view its religious character, but the fact that it blames the victim. If she were right, then no one who is right with God would be living in poverty. Ironically, the argument strikes me as warmed over Herbert Spencer with a twist of religion--the irony in that combination being Spencer's own staunch antireligous stance. The roots of poverty are primarily societal, not individual. The advantage of claiming them to be essentailly individual is a little like the advantage of not admitting that climate change is happening. If the origins are individual, you can leave fighting poverty to God (and maybe the churches)--the government is off the hook. As chance would have it, yesterday I listened to a lengthy radio report on the 50th anniversary of the papal encyclical, Populorum Progressio. The reporter made the point that before

8 Vatican II, the Catholic Church emphasized fighting social ills mainly by building churches and trying to save souls--much in keeping with Mayor Taylor's take on things. The encyclical shifted the focus to flighting inequality, increasing access to education, and limiting, through legislation, the negative impact of unbridled liberal capitalism. The encyclical was highly controversial and rooted in a very different view of poverty than Mayor Taylor's. Some in the Catholic Church still would agree more with Ivy Taylor than with the encyclical published in A former chancellor of Austria, Fred Sinowatz, once analyzed the political situation at the time (1983) by saying that, it is all so complicated. A truer word was never spoken. All the best, From Craig Becker, Greenville, SC Thank you Don. I agree completely with your perspective. As you said, what more do we have than semantics to articulate REAL wellness and distinguish it from all else (e.g., prevention, healing and so on)? What you describe, however, is an approach to a higher potential for achievement. From Lutz Hertel, Dusseldorf, Germany (Re the NWC workshop about a new paradigm.) Good questions to raise awareness and to trigger thinking processes. I like it! From Judd Allen, Burlington, VT Thank you for your fun take on happiness. Starting in a culture (such as those found in Scandinavia) which tries to treat all people well makes happiness a lot easier. Happiness is a lot trickier when society is cruel and intolerant. We could find happiness in the process of taking on big challenges like addressing poverty and prejudice. Pursuing a meaningful life and a happy life can be achieved with persistence and creativity. Happy day. R-E-A-L wellness - lifestyles and mindsets guided by reason, inspired by exuberance, supported with athleticism and enabled by liberty R - for reason, decision-making based on facts, evidence and science. E - for exuberance - focus on happiness and joy, meaning and purpose,

9 etc. A - for athleticism - sound nutrition and vigorous daily exercise for fitness. L - for liberty-freedom from superstitions & all forms of magical thinking. Copyright AWR-RW LLC - all rights reserved